


Nakamagoroshi

by morecivilizedage



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Clan Politics, M/M, Multi, Ninja Politics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-01
Updated: 2017-02-01
Packaged: 2018-09-21 06:56:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9536876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morecivilizedage/pseuds/morecivilizedage
Summary: "All shinobi die, but, with good friends and a few surprises tucked away, you might die last."





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pentapus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pentapus/gifts).



_"Your friends are your greatest defense," the kunoichi had said to him, crouching down to meet his eyes.  She was the only one of father's friends who did, and she promised not to tell Sakumo that he was up far past his bedtime.  (Kakashi still wanted to start training together early in the morning, after all).  The candlelight from the kitchen glinted off the spiral on her forehead protector._

I just want to be stronger, _he had said, all of three years old,_ the best.  I want to defend the village forever.   _She laughed._

 _"All shinobi die," she said, reaching out to ruffle his hair.  Begrudgingly, Kakashi let her.  "But, the strongest shinobi is the one with friends.  With good friends and a few surprises tucked away, you might die last_. _"_

 

* * *

 

Kakashi jolts up, awake, breathing ragged and his body trembling as it feels like his muscles seize.  He shuts his eyes and tilts his head back.  The scared-terrified look on Obito's face, the sparking light of chidori at the corner of his vision, flashes in relief against his eyelids.

 _It wasn't like that_ , the voice in the back of his head says, soft.

'I know.'  He stands, slowly, all long, graceful limbs and a professional's silence.

 _Don't you_ dare _go to the kitchens and turn the faucet on, Bakashi_.

Kakashi stops, and changes directions midstep, to sit down at the lone chair in his very small jounin apartment.  "Okay," he says, out loud into the silence.  "Okay."

He sits in the chair, hands resting against the wood grain of his desk, and stares out the window until the light of dawn casts its long shadows through Konoha.

There is a commentary to be made, about how quickly he packs up all of his belongings from this small shell of an apartment—how swiftly all the signs of life are tucked away into barely a pockets-worth of storage scrolls, but as his mental interlocutor seems inclined to remain silent, so does he.

He slips the notice of vacancy under his door, leaps out the window, and never looks back.

 

* * *

 

"You make an excellent field shinobi, Iruka; you could have quite the future.  I could recommend to have you put on the official rotations list."

Iruka pastes on his best smile, "I am honored by the offer, Funaki-san, but I will have to decline.  I am still figuring things out, after all."   Career chuunin Funaki Nao grunts, and crosses her arms.

"I like you, Iruka– you don't have any of those crazy notions about how the only ninja worth being is some fancy jounin taking nothing but A-rank or S-rank missions.  But, you're almost twenty.  You need to start looking ahead.  Missions like this—the outpost resupply circuit, border reconnaissance, courier runs—they make up the real backbone of the village."  Iruka hopes that his drifting attention isn't visible on this face.  Nao squints at him, and rests her hands on her hips.  At 38 years old, 5'4" and _maybe_ 46 kilos, Iruka doesn't understand how she manages to be so much intimidating than her size merits.

"Don't tell me you are still trying for an Academy seat."  Iruka can feel the strain at the corners of his eyes grow deeper as his smile wavers.  "Umino Iruka."  Nao clucks her tongue.  "The Academy program certainly won't be expanding any time soon, and with a youth record like yours–" Iruka suppresses a wince "–it's likely little more than an imposible pipe dream, as well as a _severe waste of your talent_.  Iruka–"

Iruka gives a very unsubtle glance to his watch and dips his head hastily.  "Forgive me, Funaki-san, but since we arrived back later than planned, I only have an hour before my shift at the Administrations Building."  With that, he tilts his head in almost an apology and rabbits off over the rooftops.

Nao hollers after him, " _—still a better use of your talents than TEACHING_!"  Almost a block and a half away from her bellow, Iruka doesn't bother to hide his grimace.  It is hard enough, trying to get the rest of the B-class requirements and extra teaching certifications _without_ everyone deciding for him that it is a terrible career choice.  Terrible or not, it was _his_ choice to make.

 

* * *

 

It's the sudden ceasing of the shuffle of papers, and the way much of the bustle of a weekday dies, that causes Iruka to look up, with a sigh.

Kakashi Hatake, village loner and jounin-legend, beams at Iruka with his eyes upturned into dramatic smiles.

"Can I help you find anything, Hatake-san?" Iruka asks, face as blank as he can make it.  After their first, rather interesting, meeting, Hatake always comes to him, whether it is on his shifts at the Missions Desk, or here, in the general Administrations Building.  Iruka isn't sure if it's just another quirk—maintaining strange consist behaviors, or if Hatake holds some sort of strange regard for him.  Regardless, a day with Hatake is always interesting.

"I just came in to drop of this," the jounin waves a form at Iruka, before setting it down on desk, as if expecting Iruka to read from his mind what form it is, of the thirty-odd forms Iruka has helped the jounin find over the past few weeks.  Iruka just stares at him, unimpressed, and ignores the sudden frightened intake of breath from Eguchi-san two desks over.  Hatake gestures at the form, with a whimsical excitement.  "It's the form for my updated living accommodations."

"Thank you very much, Hatake-san."  Iruka says at last and glances down at the form, where Hatake's painstakingly precise but awkward kanji neatly fill all the requires spaces.  Hatale writes like he can read fluently, but was only ever sat down and taught to write maybe five times in his whole life.  All of his characters are carefully, meticulously shaped, like they were copied out of a practice book.  Given that he doesn't try near as hard when he gives his signature, Iruka can only imagine that his Mission Reports are hellish to attempt to read.

Hatake deliberately stretches in Eguchi-san's direction to cause her to squeak and Iruka has to bite down on a smile.  He'd have probably asked that Hatake refrain from terrorizing the other administrative assistants, if Eguchi-san hadn't spent the first twenty minutes of Iruka's shift, complaining about how important it was to be timely, after he had showed up _one minute late_.

Hatake hovers at the desk a moment, as if about to say something more, before he finally nods, firmly and politely, and strolls laconically out the door, posture slumped and hands in his pockets, before suddenly straightening at the door-frame, sending Eguchi-san and the rest of the staff flinching once more.

Iruka just turns to the cluster of shinobi theoretically in line—as if they weren't watching a man known as _friend-killer_ amble out of the building like a petrified raft of loons—and hollers, in his best assistant-teacher voice, "NEXT!"

 

* * *

 

_"Thank you for your hard work, shinobi-san."  Iruka barely looked up from the missions report in front of him, holding out his hand to take the report of the next person in line.  If he could just get through the rest of the mission turn-in rush hour, he could back to planning out the restructuring of the assignment and request process. Nao had given him an idea about how to set up the cycles for the outpost station resupply, and if he could have some time to sit down with the current rosters and pencil it out, he was pretty certain that he would have something to show the Sandaime at their next tea._

_After about a minute of grasping futilely at the air for a materialized missions report, Iruka looked up to find a surprisingly emptied mission room, and a strange shinobi—jounin, judging by the gear—standing in front of him, both eyes upturned in a smile.  There was a scar running most the length of his visible face, bisecting his left eye, and a mask was pulled up over his mouth.  Iruka fought down his impatience and asked, as nicely as he could:_

_"Can I help you, shinobi-san?"_

_The shinobi pulled a thin sheaf of crumpled pages from his flak vest._

_"I was trying to find the mission-qualifier form for clan registration, but none of these seem to be the right thing.:  His voice was surprisingly deep, with an odd, lilting quality to it.  The jounin uniform was fairly standard; perhaps the whole attitude was the quirk.  Iruka had yet to meet a jounin without one, he was beginning to suspect that somewhere on the jounin evaluation metric there was a requirement for 'manifestation of crazy'._

_The jounin placed his papers carefully down on Iruka's desk and tried to flatten out the wrinkles.  Iruka sighed and shooed the hands away absently as he began to look over the forms._

_"Well, to start, these are all forms for already established clans."  Iruka rested a hand on top of the stack of papers, and began to rifle through the lower desk drawer with the other, already searching for a new form._

_"Maa, but it is an established clan–"  Iruka stopped and looked back up at the jounin again, staring.  The jounin shrugged his shoulders dramatically, "–though somewhat of a lapsed one."_

_Iruka stared, somewhat slack-jawed, mind frantically trying to place what little there was of the exposed face to the list of historic clans that he'd had to memorize for the first of his teaching certifications.  Who the hell was this guy?  Snapping out of his stupor, Iruka shut the drawer and shunted his face back to one of utmost professionalism._

_"Obtaining a clan reinstatement requires formally submitted request to be recorded before the qualifying missions form is given.  Can I have your name please?"  Iruka pulled out a smaller logbook, as well as a copy of the request form.  The jounin's eyes seemed to curve up even further into a hugely exaggerated smile._

_"Hatake Kakashi."_

* * *

 

After dropping off one of the last of his required forms with his favorite desk shinobi, still has a full day's worth of preparations to set into place.  Kakashi makes it to the Hatake clan compound as dusk draws its own long shadows, shrouding the long-unused gate as Kakashi presses a hand against the center-seal, and pushes out with a soft, precise pulse of chakra.

The lawns had been kept in rudimentary order by a hired gardener, and three days previous, he'd discreetly filed a D-rank to have a team come in and clear out any dust and debris, preparing the compound for habitation.

It doesn't... it doesn't _look_ lived in, but as Kakashi enters through the kitchen's door to the vegetable garden, and releases the storage seals containing his meagre belongings, it feels more like potential than it ever had before.  He sets the framed photo of his team on the sill of the kitchen window.

 _You've got this, Kakashi_.

' _We_ 've got this', is his mental reply before he rolls his head to crack his neck, and steps out of the kitchen, looking down the hallway as it begins to curve off into the many rooms of the household, eyes skipping over where he knows his father's– the master room to be.  He squares his shoulders and begins to prowl the estate, and take an objective evaluation.  There was still some last touches of work he needed to do, if he was going to make this a home.

 

* * *

 

By the time Iruka has finished his Administration Building shift and dropped by the Mission's Desk to check his hours for the next week, it's already evening.  On a whim, he swings out over by the open Training Grounds, where he knows Gai should be wrapping up his civilian taijutsu and exercise class.

It is something of a strange sort of friendship, but past all the bright spandex and eye-blinding grins, Gai is the model shinobi.  He's always punctual, polite, helpful...  Nao might complain about youngsters only thinking elite jounin are the only shinobi worth being, but a lot of jounin don't exactly go out of their way to appreciate the support structure that bolsters them up.  Gai does.  Always thanking the shinobi at the Missions Desk, or on the supply circuit, or a million and one other vital-but- thankless jobs that usually fall on the shoulders of career chuunin.

Iruka had happened to recognize him on his way to the Academy, once, while Gai was teaching one of Iruka later learned to be several exercise and self-defense classes for civilians.  Iruka had waved, Gai had hollered back a greeting, and Iruka had stopped for a quick chat which turned into a discussion on how to revise the outpost resupply schedules a finer appreciation for the beauty that is Konoha.  By the time Iruka had realized the time, he had to sprint to make it to class on time, and found himself in possession of a new, very interesting friend.

"Iruka-sensei!"  Gai's grin is brilliant as always, as he finally calls his class to rest, and dismisses them, taking the time to give each of his 'students' encouraging words on their progress as they head home.  "Your mission went well?"

"Gai!  Yeah, yeah it did.  The new schedules aren't quite finished yet, but there's definitely been progress on shifting to the newer routes."  Iruka rolls his shoulders, and leans against a training post as Gai gathers up the few supplies he brings for such classes.  "Join me for ramen?"

"I'd be delighted, Iruka-sensei!"  And, perhaps, one of his favorite things about Gai, is that—once he'd confessed his desire to become a teacher, despite all the obstacles, _Gai believed he could do it_.  It was nice to not have to argue, every once in a while.

 

* * *

 

It's a quiet table, for the longest time, as Iruka mulls over how to approach what he wants to say.  When Iruka had first mentioned his sort-of-repeated acquaintance with Hatake Kakashi, Gai's bushy eyebrows had risen in surprise, before he asked, politely, if Iruka was willing to share more.  In this, sort of unnamed _thing_ between them, Gai had remained supportive as well, often asking about details Iruka would have thought to dismiss, as well as giving him advice that was... actually very helpful in handling Hatake.

"I think... I think Hatake Kakashi is up to something."

Gai, patient, amazing soul that he is, only smiles and waits patiently.

"At first, he was just getting a bunch of forms.  None of them seemed all that related to each other, but today, he turned in a form at the desk."  Iruka twirls his chopsticks in his ramen bowl. "At _my_ desk," he corrects himself, before setting his chopsticks down and folding his hands together.

"Is that not usually what one does at the Missions and Administration Desks?" Gai asks, and while there is a hint of amusement in his tone, it isn't directed at Iruka.  For not the first time in his many talks with Gai, Iruka is getting the impression that the jounin helping nudge him along the trail of breadcrumbs in front of him, and that he knows a great deal more than he lets on.

"Not Hatake, he's always turned them in at odd hours.  In the drop box, or a slush pile, or on one occasion, stapled to the door of the supply closet."  Iruka was eighty percent sure he did that to mess with people, which Iruka could get behind, when just about everyone in the village made sure to leave a nice little radius of space around you when you passed by.  "But this one he turned in directly."

"Because...?" Gai asks, as he slurps up the last of his bowl, and rests his chin on his hand, one of his Youthful grins teasing at the corners of his lips.

"Because..."  Maybe something to do with after it was turned in? What did Iruka do after getting it? He marked it as completed, filed it away, and updated the system.  Just like he would have with every other form handed in.  Iruka doesn't gossip about other people's nonsense, he just does his job as swiftly and efficiently as possible.  (That he may have also mentally gathered a prankster's blackmail material while he was at it was immaterial).  Iruka may be diligent and generally not a snitch, but it wasn't like the others were incapable of doing their jobs, just "...slower."

"Iruka-sensei?"  There is something about Gai's careful not-smile, the way he is gently easing Iruka to come to his own conclusions... Gai definitely knows _something_ about what was going on.

"Because he needed it filed right away," Iruka says at last, feeling out the words with his tongue as if to weigh the truth of them.  "But why?"

Gai leans back in his chair, folding his chopsticks neatly over his empty ramen bowl, and smiles.

"If Hatake Kakashi needs something done quickly, the 'why' will not take very long to show itself."  Gai stands, then, and stretches, before bowing his head at Iruka.  "Thank you, Iruka-sensei, for your invigorating company tonight." Gai flashes his trademark grin, before waving at Teuchi.  "I believe it is my turn to pay for this fine meal?"

 

* * *

 

By the time Monday rolls around, Iruka has completely forgotten about anything but the terrors in front of him.  The senior instructor for his class in had called in sick at the last moment, which means that Iruka is scrambling to come up with a curriculum on the spot, as well as keeping a class full of wannabe ninja hellions all on task.

Iruka takes a deep breath, to gather himself.  It is a good opportunity, he tells himself, as a hand reaches out on instinct to catch a flying stick of chalk, before flicking it back to nail the perpetrator between the eyes.  How he manages today can hopefully grease some wheels he's trying to get rolling to complete his teaching certification.  He looks back out over his students again—this generation's full crop of future clan heads _and_ the Kyuubei—and suppresses the desire to grip the bridge of his nose.  (The first lesson he ever learned, as an assistant teacher, you never show children—much less _shinobi_ children—any sort of weakness.)  Naruto is a handful enough on his own, without the encouragement of his posse of almost-undisciplinables.  In theory, he can talk to Yoshino-sensei about Shikamaru, but it feels a bit weird to tattle on the son of the _jounin commander_ just because his wife is your old sensei.  Besides, he needs to _prove_ he can handle these kids.  If he can _teach_ them, truly instill them with the basics that they need to know, and the real meaning of the Will of Fire.

If he can teach them to stand together, strong.  If he can ensure that no child will slip through the cracks—

And on that note: Iruka has yet to determine _who_ , exactly, had dared Naruto to set the contents of several bottles of glue to explode and spray across the classroom, sending children screeching and ducking under their desks, but he has a few decent guesses.  Such a typical prank.  (To be honest, there's a tiny part of him that's little disappointed Naruto didn't think of something more clever, in true prankster form.)  In half a moment, he's cleared the distance between them and is firmly gripping Naruto's ear to drag the kid out to the hallway and begin _yet another_ tirade of a lecture, while Naruto grins, wide.

It is still a little unsettling, strange, to see the bright blond tuft of hair of a too-loud, too-rambunctious child and know that the fox-demon was sealed inside.

It is stranger still, when he pushes aside his instinctual fear, and finds a snot-nosed little brat, who—but for his appearance—could be Iruka reborn.

He frog-marches Naruto back inside, and looks out over the utter mess of glue, and sighs.

"Today's class will be held outside, today."

As the kids erupt into cheers, and a few even subtly high-five Naruto, Iruka shakes his head and bites back the smile teasing at his lips.  He can't be caught encouraging this sort of behavior, after all.

Only Sasuke is quiet, in the back, and Iruka worries for him, but what can he do?  He's only an Assistant Instructor, and barely, at that.

 

* * *

 

When Kakashi drops by the school, hidden, Iruka has managed to wrangle all the little hellions outside and participating in a set of surprisingly orderly and useful exercises.  Nudging, through carefully-overheard conversations, the idea of a glue-bomb in Naruto's head was genius.  He grins at the blond spot of sunshine.  All of Minato's energy with all of Kushina's firm passion and undefeatable resolve.

There are two pangs in one chest, and Kakashi turns his attention swiftly elsewhere.  He can't afford the weakness, right now.

It's impressive, the way Iruka handles the children, guiding them back on track with a patience that is severely unappreciated, and ensuring that each student gets attention and aid, even with the wide variance of skill levels present in the class.

And there are idiots on the council who don't think that shinobi like _Iruka_ , shinobi who truly embody Konoha's _Will of Fire_ , should be teachers.

_We'll have to do something to deal with that, won't we?_

Kakashi smiles behind the cloth of his mask, before turning away from the scene.

'You just like to piss of Danzo,' Kakashi thinks, as his smile grows, briefly, into a baring of his canines.  The grin in his head is just as toothy.

 _That too_.

 

* * *

 

It bothers the active-duty shinobi part of him, the silence that falls when he enters the council room.  A shinobi was never meant to be seen or heard, and the weight of their focused stares settles uncomfortably over his shoulders, though he does not allow it to show. 

 _It's because none of 'em have seen you dress up fancy since you were **four** , and now you've gone full Kumo Montsuki on them, _the voice inside his head snickers.

Kakashi inwardly smiles back.  Perhaps so, but he suspects it has a lot more to do with the subtle, but very present Uchiha fan crests where the clan crests are meant to lie.

With a slow deliberateness, Kakashi walks to the clan seat that has remained soberly empty since the Uchiha massacre, and sits down, carefully surveying every face at the table.

The Sandaime's face hints at a smile as he settled down into his chair.

"Hatake Kakashi has accepted to take his responsibilities as the Uchiha clan head, according to the stated will of former clan head Uchiha Masashi, witnessed by myself, Nara Shikaku, and Namikaze Minato."

As most of the clan heads turn to Shikaku, curious, a dark expression briefly flashed across Danzo's face.

Kakashi turns to him, _both_ eyes glinting red before curving upwards to indicate his smile.

 

* * *

 

Hatake Kakashi taking a clan seat on the council seems to be the talk of the hour.  Which, all right, _Kakashi Friend-Killer_ makes it all the more interesting, but frankly, Iruka has yet to see anything so cold in his demeanor, and Iruka is the one who helped Kakashi find, and then later file, pretty much all of the required paperwork for Hatake to take the seat in the first place so the _shocking news_ isn't all that surprising.  More interesting are everyone's reactions.  And, of course, the slightly less staggering but still considerable amount of paperwork that Kakashi has completed that has nothing to do with clan leadership.

 _You have to look underneath the underneath_ , one of a handful of phrases that Kakashi has said that has stuck with him but for the life of him, Iruka cannot seem to figure what the underneath of _all that paperwork_ , could possibly be.  Things like having a building crew confirm the structural stability of the Hatake—now possibly Uchiha? Iruka was unclear how those sorts of things worked—family complex and grounds.  Medical records.  _Fiscal_ Records. Why in the hells—

Kotetsu nudges him in the side with his elbow, trying to draw his attention back to the discussion at hand.  Iruka just glances over at Gai, dragged earlier into Iruka's circle of friends, intending to share a wry smile, only to notice that Gai's ebullient good nature seems slightly strained.

Genma seems to be just finishing a somewhat facetious tirade on 'the state of things these days', and Anko has just headed back to the bartender for another round of drinks, when Iruka finally opens his mouth.

"So why _is_ he called Friend-killer, anyways?"

It seems like a million voices start talking at once, more rumors and speculation and anecdotes about incidents _long_ after Konoha's most solitary jounin had got his nickname.  Gai's smile grows even more strained, and Iruka is starting to get a headache, as Izumo and Genma try to speak over each other, fielding interjections from Kotetsu and Hayate.

All the babbling falls silent when Anko slams two mugs of beer down on the table.

"Hatake Kakashi was tried by tribunal for the murder of his teammate Uchiha Obito".  The table falls silent.  Gai quietly stands and leaves.  Iruka's throat feels suddenly dry.

"But he was acquitted, right?"

Anko sat down, shoving Genma out of the way as she dishes out the rest of the beer.

"I think it ended up being re-evaluated as an assisted suicide, so the charges were dropped."   Anko knocked back a beer.  "Dunno why, though, it happened in the hospital.  And later, Nohara Rin disappeared on a mission with him–"  Anko shrugged.

The conversation pretty much died after that.  Iruka excused himself to go home, head whirling.

 

* * *

 

Iruka was hallucinating.  There's an ANBU sitting on his windowsill.  It wasn’t the weirdest thing he's believed he's seen—especially after barnight with Anko—but it was a little distracting when he was finally trying to get some sleep.

The easiest way to disrupt the exhaustion-induced figments of his imagination was to attempt to interact with it. He lobbed a balled-up dirty sock at the window.  It's a terrible projectile, the wannabe-Academy-sensei in him noted.  He hadn't put near enough force behind the throw to compensate for the wobbling uneven balance of it, not to mention the terrible aerodynamics of the sock as it unrolled itself in midair.

None of those factors, however, precluded the light thunk it made as it clinked against the maybe-porcelain of the polished ANBU mask and slid slowly off its curved, painted surface to rest on the floor.

Iruka stared.

The ANBU's shoulders hitched, slightly, almost as if to indicate laughter.  Iruka could feel his face heat.

There are a few more moments of silent staring, when at last the ANBU unfolded from where they were crouched on the windowsill and _daintily_ stepped over the fallen sock, to stand in the room.

"Tell me about your class, sensei."  For all the deliberate character to his movements, the ANBU's voice is an oddly flat tenor, and maddening familiar, somehow. The frission of delight at being referred to as 'sensei' is quickly overwhelmed by the well of confusion.  Distracted by the disconnect between mannerism and tone, it took a few moments for Iruka to register the question.

"My _class_?"

"Nine-through-eleven year olds," the ANBU said, and pulled from his vest pocket what looks to be a copy of his class roster.  "Tell me about them."  The ANBU cocked his head.  Even with the mask, Iruka could feel the weight of his gaze.  No killing intent, just... consideration, focus.  In some ways, it's more unsettling.

He opened his mouth to speak, before snapping it shut.  This felt like a test.  Iruka shook his head.

"Apologies, ANBU-san, but until I know that you have authorization to receive a report, I have to decline.  I must protect my students."  The ANBU straightened his back.  For a moment, that focus sharpens.  In its wake comes the heavy, choking pressure of killing intent.

Iruka took it back, he'd rather have the staring focus.

"Even from ANBU, sensei?"

Iruka swallowed past the saliva thick in his mouth.

"Even from ANBU, ANBU-san."

And just like that, the killing intent cut off, and pressure was gone.  Iruka took a small, gasping, breath, and the ANBU cocked his head again, and this time, there was something almost like warmth in his flat voice.

"I'll come back with the proper documentation, sensei.  Thank you for your time."

Before Iruka could respond, the ANBU was out the window and gone.

 

* * *

 

 _Bakashi, don't go scaring the kid shitless_.  Kakashi's lips twitched upwards, under his mask.

Umino Iruka only grew more and more interesting.

'Will of Fire,' Kakashi thinks.

_Will of Fire._

There is a moment of silence, before the mental voice speaks again.

_Also, Gai likes him.  You can't get better than that._

 

* * *

 

The truth, or the first _part_ of it, behind Hatake's unpleasant moniker has Iruka trying to re-find his balance.  He can't quite bring himself to believe it.  Or, at least, believe that that is the entirety.  Not if the Sandaime and the rest of the council approved his appointment to clan head.

It just doesn't fit, somehow, with the jounin who vacillates so swiftly between intense shinobi and lackadaisical observer.  With the shinobi who asks Iruka to find the strangest forms for him, and fills them out with care before delivering them in some of the strangest ways imagineable.  There has to be something more.

 _Underneath the underneath_ , he thinks, but that helps with absolutely nothing at all.

 

* * *

 

The first thing Iruka notices, when the ANBU from the other night shows up in his windowsill again, are the identity markings on the scroll.  Somehow, the ANBU has managed to not only obtain permission, but a _clan head subpoena._   That isn't the sort of thing just anyone can get their hands on.  Honestly, its not even something that _elite shinobi_ can get their hands on.  In fact, there are _exactly eleven_ people who can get access to such a... no, there are twleve, now.  Iruka's brow wrinkles, as the last pieces to the paperwork puzzle he'd been tossing around in his head finally start to slot together in his head.

He holds a hand out, just as imperious as he is when he's sorting through missions at the Missions Desk, and isn't about to tolerate delays.

The ANBU's posture becomes extremely laconic, as he passes over the subpoena with all promptness, the relaxed posture and amused tilt to his head making Iruka think the ANBU is grinning, behind the porcelain.

Any last-second doubts Iruka had are quashed in an instant.  That carefully precise and stilted strokes to each of the characters, so that they were all painstakingly clear.

Hatake Kakashi had filed thirty-odd different forms with the same handwriting.

Iruka steels himself, before looking up again, to squarely meet the dark chasm-holes that the ANBU masks consider eyes.

"I would like to know why."

The ANBU stiffens, and something more like the real predator Iruka knows Hatake is supposed to be, comes out.

"Pardon?"  It's not Hatake's normal voice, to be certain, but Iruka can hear the threads of it.  He wonders if there are others who have met them both, but can't tell the difference.  He wonders if there is anyone _close_ enough to Hatake for them to know.

"I would like to know, Hatake-san, why you are so interested in my class."  The ANBU shifts, as if about to respond, but Iruka continues on.  If he doesn't get it out, he knows he'll lose his nerve.  He's only a chuunin of three years, trying to be an Academy teacher, which is _nothing_ , when it comes the scale of magnitude in which Hatake's skill reside, but _these are his students_ , and he has to try.  "–And before you say Uchiha Sasuke, I'm going to stop you right there.  The whole village knows when the 'last true Uchiha' so much as _sneezes_ , so there is _something else_ that you are interested in."

Hatake stills, before settling into a carefully folded position on one of Iruka's spare chairs.

"The Yondaime's son is in your class."

Almost as if from a strange distance, Iruka can watching himself as this information buffers into his head.

"The _Yondaime Hokage's_ son?"  Iruka's voice cracks over the words.  Hatake cocks his head.

"He was my jounin-sensei.  The sensei of Team 7."

"The team that you–"  Iruka halts, but already he's fairly certain he's shoved his foot into his mouth.

 

* * *

 

Kakashi actually wants to laugh a little, at the expression of discomfited embarrassment that crosses Iruka's face.  That's the most politely blunt way that anyone has tried to confront him about his moniker in ages.

_Kakashi..._

"Go ahead, Iruka-sensei.  Finish your sentence."  Kakashi doesn't bother to use his ANBU voice, the amusement in his normal tone conveys much better, and it isn't as though his identity hasn't been thoroughly blown.  If it becomes an issue, Kakashi can _deal_ with it.  Even if he'd rather not use such methods on this particular shinobi.

Iruka swallows and squares his shoulders.

"Why do they say you killed your genin teammates?"

Kakashi is stunned silent.

 _I think, perhaps, I should step forward_.

Kakashi, still reeling from the idea that someone other than Gai is willing to grant him the benefit of a doubt, can only mentally nod along.

'Yeah, okay'

 

* * *

 

Out of the blue, Hatake slumps, as if all his muscles suddenly fell limp.  In the next, he is sitting as a different man.  The false-laconic posture that Iruka had considered something of a trademark was but a pale imitation of _this_ , the careless fluidity of limbs that move as though they are from a slightly bulkier, fuller frame, the relaxed at ease attitude.

It's almost as if... Hatake suddenly got _friendly_.

"My name–" but the voice coming out Hatake's mouth is _wrong_.  It doesn'ts only like anything that should come from his vocal chords at all, "–is Uchiha Obito."

Iruka stares.

For a solid five minutes.

"What?" He finally asks, voice cracking like it hadn't since he'd first started to go through puberty, but Iruka figures it's probably warranted.

The ANBU reaches up to scratch at the back of his head, as if embarrassed.

"Kakashi and I," the ANBU awkwardly clears his throat, "we share a body.  His body actually.  See, uh."  The ANBU- Obito?  Kakashi? _Who the hell even knows_? Doesn't seem to know where to start.

Finally he turns his head, as if listening to a voice that only he can hear, before sighing, and straightening up into a posture that is much more serious.  Still nothing like Hatake's razor-sharp menace but... not exactly the goofy welcoming from just before, either.

"You know, at least, the basics of how I gave Kakashi my eye?"

Iruka nods.  It was something of a legend, how Hatake's teammates had performed the surgery while he was unconscious after taking a blow in a cave-in meant for his team.  The Uchiha—Obito, Iruka realizes it must have been—supposedly crushed under the rocks, and unlikely to survive.  How Hatake had woken-up mid procedure, raving, and yet somehow managed to pull some sort of doton-jutsu miracle to save both of his teammate's lives until the rescue team arrived.

There are whispered rumors that it was the Sharingan that made him mad.  Made him a friend-killer.  Some sort of Uchiha curse.  Before that, he was just a prodigy.  Now Hatake Kakashi is a Sharingan wielder with a reputation for slaying his comrades.

"What we... what we didn't know was that... Other people's brains—non-Uchiha brains—without the bloodline genetics to back it up... they can't process the massive volume of intake data, the way Uchiha do.  It drains them of the chakra, trying...  And then–"

Obito—and somehow, Iruka _does_ believe that it is Obito, even if he hasn't yet explained _how_ —falters.

 

* * *

 

Kakashi can feel it, the fear in Obito's mind.  Memories of lying, helpless and alone, in a hospital bed  with a suddenly _very interested_ Shimura Danzo, who believed that a non-Uchiha transplant of a _Sharingan Eye_ was possible.  Obito, terrified for his team and his life and his _remaining eye_ , finally confiding in Kakashi, who had been ceasely at his bedside.  How, as Obito made steps towards recovery, they had studied and plotted and planned, as Obito grew ever more certain that Danzo was going to orchestrate some sort of accident.  How at last they had decided.  How they had found a way to copy, to transfer Obito's mind and nervous pathways with _chakra_ pathways, and the overlay of two neural systems in one body.  And then that fateful day—Obito's first without fear, and the beginning of Kakashi's nightmares.

Kakashi reaches out, tentative.  _I can take it from here, if you need me to_.

'Kakashi–' Obito's mental voice trails off.  Kakashi shuts the eyes of his mental-self, and gathers his resolve.

_I need to tell this next part, myself._

Such a prominent force of his nightmares, after all.  Kakashi wants to own up to it.

'Okay,'  Obito says, at last, and yields over control.

It's a weird feeling, coming back into one's own body again.  He stretches out, relearning each and every twitch of his muscles, before settling back into a posture that is whole Hatake Kakashi.

"Shimura Danzo... saw my continued survival as proof of success, and—in our young fear of my eye being taken away, and Obito's helplessness—no one else knew differently.  Obito was... afraid for himself, for me, for our eyes, and so we... we came up with a plan."

Kakashi takes a deep breath.  He isn't sure why he is sharing this, why _they_ are sharing this.  It's deep, and aching, and... perhaps they have held it in, too long, between them, and now, at this crack it bursts forth like a wellspring.

Kakashi almost stops, looking at Iruka who is watching him—them—with a face curiously devoid of any sort of judgement.

 _Will of Fire_ , Obito whispers into his ear, and Kakashi straightens his shoulders.

"Together we used our sharingan, and our knowledge of seals and... we copied and mapped Obito's neural pathways to work with and lie alongside mine.  As I killed him."

Obito hisses at him with wordless displeasure at the phrasing, but he doesn't comment.  Just as Kakashi can feel Obito's emotions and thoughts, so too can Obito see Kakashi's nightmares, time and time again, of his chidori-hand aimed at Obito's right eye.

Here is where the nightmares stop, but memory continues—the tomoe of their Sharingan spinning— _sharpening_ —in unison, the way the Kamui dimension phases Obito's right-eye out of danger, how Kakashi's chidori meets no resistance, how at the last moment, his hand shifts, too, into the Kamui dimension, devoid of lightning and chakra, and grasps around Obito's eye as their neural pathways and nervous systems combine and collapse upon each other, both of them shaking together in one body.

How, later, found cradling the husk of Obito's body in his arms, with the trademark scars of Kakashi's chidori, supposedly undeniable proof of the destruction of Obito's second sharingan, he is called before a tribunal.

How Kakashi replays, haltingly, with his Sharingan, for Uchiha Masashi, Minato-sensei, and the Sandaime, the moment itself as well as Obito's fears and collected witness of Danzo's plotting.

How he is named friend-killer, ever after that.

Kakashi lifted both hands up, and removed his ANBU mask.  Both eyes opened and exposed, glowing red, as the tomoe lazily spun, extending into paired angular pinwheels.

 

* * *

 

The explanation is fantastical, but the proof lays before his eyes.  Iruka will wrestle with his desire to understand the how's later.   For the moment, he'll just accept that it is.

But, now that that is all done with.

"...But what does this have to do with the son of the Yondaime?"

Iruka has realized that he's become very good at reading Hatake– _Kakashi_ 's body language, the way he tenses, minutely, with surprise.  The way it softens into an embarrassment, unlike Obito's shameless shame, but more refined, withdrawn.

"The Sandaime doesn't allow people to talk about the Yondaime's son.  Namikaze Minato's son with _Uzumaki_ Kushina."  And in Iruka's mind, the last few little pieces slot into place.  All those extraneous forms, about health and finances and the _stability_ of Kakashi's _home_.  "And to have the student of the Yondaime adopt a small blond orphan that looks just like him?  We weren't... I wasn't allowed."

Then, suddenly, is Kakashi's grin.  The one that is all in the curvature of his eyes, the way they become exaggerated, upturned u's.

"But the head of a near-decimated clan, legendary for its power and prestige, adopting the jinchuuriki—"

Iruka thinks of Naruto, and how desperately he wants to be noticed.

He thinks of Kakashi (and Obito), who wants, so desperately, to be _allowed_ to _notice him_.

Who realized that he (they?) would never get what he wanted, so he found a way to sneak around, and get it, anyways.  Through possibly the most convoluted, hare-brained scheme possible.

Iruka thinks about all of the little ways he's been wheedling his way into becoming a teacher, and he _laughs_.

Kakashi Friend-Killer, Kakashi of the Sharingan, Kakashi and his fucked-up shared mind space with his best friend Obito.

Kakashi the legend, who is just as much of a mess as he is: a 'wash-out', 'late-promotion' career chuunin.

It's the funniest thing Iruka has ever heard.

 

* * *

 

It's an interesting silence that rests between them, as they both meet a block away from where Gai holds his morning class.  It still feels fragile.  The result of a forced-emotional closeness, where their shared relationship has deepened, simply because of what Iruka now _knows_ , when he hasn't really learned enough of Kakashi-the-person to necessarily justify being deserving of that knowledge.  But, learning more about the process that it took to get here, as they talked late into the night and early into the morning, before finally turning in—so briefly—to their respective beds, Iruka realizes he _wants_ to know Kakashi that way, more than an acquaintanceship based on shared moments of humor as Iruka helps him with yet another form.  Iruka wants to know the sort of man who takes on the mind of his best friend–to save him from death and destruction, who takes on duties he never would have to assume to dodge around the rules that keep him from those he loves, who bears the name _friend-killer_ to keep those he loves safe, even as it alienates him from the very village he would give his lifeblood to protect.

The sort of man who spills his heart to a wannabe academy teacher, because, "Iruka, what you are... what you try to teach your kids, every day you have them, is Konoha's _Will of Fire_.  And there is nothing more important to this village, than raising the next generation to rely on each other like that."  (And, half-joking input from Obito, 'Also, Gai approves, so you must be good people.')

As they approach the field, Gai notices, and hollers out:

"Ah, Iruka-sensei!  My Eternal Rival!"  Iruka whips his head over to look at Kakashi, who shrugs, lackadaisical, and Iruka finds he has to suppress another snort of laughter.  Kakashi looks dramatically heavenward, as if searching for salvation from this moment.  Iruka snickers louder.

Things aren't perfect, yet.  Kakashi is still mess, Iruka is still only an assistant-teacher trying to drop the 'assistant', Naruto is still guardian-less, and Danzo is still at large with whatever other unpleasantness he has been plotting, especially now that Kakashi has stepped forward to start to challenge him.

But Iruka has friends.  And maybe even more, now, with a little work and trust.  And maybe he won't just change his own class, making sure that no one falls through the cracks.  Maybe it'll grow even bigger than that.

His 'impossible pipe dream' seems just a little more possible.

 

* * *

 

 _Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: "What!  You too?  I thought I was the only one._ – C.S. Lewis

**Author's Note:**

> So, uh, this has been my problem child fic. I'm such a huge fan of pentapus' works, so getting them for the exchange was, uh, intimidating, but also really exciting, especially since one of the prompts was "Kakashi's reputation among other jounin/other ninja/other villages/civilians".
> 
> And Kakashi has this WONDERFUL moniker of "Kakashi Friend-Killer" that I feel doesn't get near as much exploration or care as it should, to my mind.
> 
> There's a lot to this slightly-shifted to the left AU that I wanted to cover, but didn't get the chance to, and even as I have really been frustrated with how many pieces this fic wanted to be, as well as a series of really sucky RL surprises that kept showing up more and more and more.
> 
> I might come back and play in this world later. We shall see.


End file.
